


Rara Avis - The Leopard

by cutsycat



Series: Dictionary.Com Word of the Day Drabbles [1144]
Category: NCIS
Genre: Gen, M/M, Spirit Animal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-23 04:21:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16611851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cutsycat/pseuds/cutsycat
Summary: A bloody leopard shows up at Gibbs' house. What is going on? And why does the leopard have Tony's eyes?





	1. The Leopard

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cutsycat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cutsycat/gifts).



> Another dictionary.com word of the day drabble. This time from 06/18/2002 for the word [rara avis](http://www.dictionary.com/wordoftheday/2002/06/18/rara%20avis).
> 
> rara avis  
> A rare or unique person or thing.
> 
> We're starting back up with a decent sized story. I didn't do the big bang this year, but I have 2 stories above 5k coming up(this one and tomorrow's). I hope they will appease the people who wanted me to do a big bang. Hope you all enjoy.
> 
> This is for Stocking Stuffer #14 requested by cutsycat (me) for the 2017 Happy Holidays Challenge, [here](https://ncis-discuss.livejournal.com/95769.html).
> 
> P.S. This is complete and I will be posting all the chapters today.

# 

Rara Avis - The Leopard

Roar. Growl. Heavy breathing. 

Gibbs grabbed his gun just in case. The sound came from his front porch. It sounded vaguely dog like, but not quite right, could be human or animal.

A squeak or whimper. Gibbs looked through his peephole, but didn’t see anything. He opened the door cautiously anyway. 

At first, he couldn’t see anything other than blood. Was it dead? What even was it?

How had this rara avis come to be here? Had he missed a fight happening on his porch somehow? But no, the blood seemed confined to the leopard on his porch, so it seemed unlikely that there had been an actual fight on his porch.

The eyes opened, bright green like Tony’s, and Gibbs couldn’t deny the intelligence in them. What was he supposed to do with a leopard? Who had left the leopard? 

He didn’t remember hearing the sounds of a vehicle taking off. Had one of his neighbors left it? Why would they leave him a bleeding leopard?

For that matter, why would anyone leave him a bloody leopard? He picked up the newspaper and flicked through the headlines, but nothing mentioned an escaped leopard. Heading inside, he turned on his TV in the basement.

The farm report blared out, but again no report of an escaped leopard. He turned around to go back to his porch only to stop short when he realized that the leopard had followed him into his house. They engaged in a staring contest as the leopard stared him down from the top of the stairs. 

It went on for at least a full minute before Gibbs’ shook his head and broke the stare. Why was he staring down a leopard? Marching up the stairs, Gibbs glared at the leopard practically daring it to block his path. 

The leopard moved out of the way, slowly, but not favoring any paws. Despite the blood, Gibbs didn’t think the leopard actually injured. That meant this wasn’t a case for Ducky. 

Gibbs pulled out his phone and dialed Fornell. “My house. Now.” 

Click. He pressed the end call button before Fornell had even gotten Gibbs name out. Scrolling through his contacts, he dialed McGee next.

“We got a case, boss?”

“My house.” 

Click. Gibbs called Bishop next. 

“Gibbs.”

“Gathering. My place.”

“Case?”

Click. Gibbs didn’t bother answering her question. They would all figure it out once they arrived.

He stared at his phone wondering if he should call Tony. For some reason, his gut was telling him not to involve Tony. That didn’t make any sense to him, but then he glanced at the leopard with it’s green eyes like Tony’s and decided not to call Tony in.

Gibbs didn’t want any proof that Tony could be the leopard. It was better not to call DiNozzo then to call him and have him not answer because he was the leopard. He hoped that whatever this was, Tony wasn’t actually involved, but Gibbs could admit at least to himself that that wasn’t likely.

Tony was always in the middle of whatever trouble they found. It would be nice for this time to be different, but for now, Gibbs couldn’t chance it. The leopard had leapt on the couch and just laid watching Gibbs. 

Fornell arrived first. “Gibbs!” he yelled.

The leopard gave a little jump and turned it’s head to glare at the interloper. Gibbs grunted at Fornell.

“Why am I here, Gibbs?”

Gibbs tilted his head towards the leopard.

“Is that a leopard?”

“Yep,” Gibbs drawled.

“You called me here for a leopard?”

“Yep.”

“Why is it covered in blood? Aw. Crap. You didn’t shoot it, did you? That’s illegal you know.”

Gibbs glared at Fornell. “I didn’t shoot it.”

“Why is it watching me?”

“You’re noisy.”

“Also, those eyes seem familiar.”

Gibbs merely grunted.

“Where’s DiNoetzo?”

Gibbs shrugged.

“Did you call me just to stare and grunt at me, Gibbs? If so, I’m leaving.”

“I don’t know where DiNozzo is.”

“What is this, Gibbs?”

“What it looks like. I found the leopard on my porch.”

McGee entered Gibbs’ house and stopped to stare at the leopard and Fornell. “Uh boss, what’s going on? Leopard?”

“That’s what you’re here to figure out McGee.”

McGee nodded, a confused expression on his face. He opened his mouth and then closed it again. Fornell ignored McGee giving Gibbs a long stare.

“You found the leopard on your porch?”

“You hard of hearing, Tobias?”

“You have to admit that doesn’t make much sense in any universe, Gibbs.”

“What doesn’t make sense?” Bishop cheerfully greeted.

“Gibbs finding a leopard on his porch,” McGee offered with a shrug.

“That is a bit strange,” she agreed. “Also why is it covered in blood?”

Gibbs grunted. 

“Your guess is as good as ours, Bishop.” Fornell shrugged. 

“Does that leopard have Tony’s eyes?” McGee squeaked.

“It’s not just me!” Fornell crowed.

Bishop eyed Fornell warily. “I thought we had a case, Gibbs. What’s going on? Where’s Tony?”

“Not here.”

“Ok…” Bishop drawled out… “Then where?”

“DiNozzo’s not here.”

“Are we waiting for him?”

“Nope.”

“Uh. Boss? What’s going on?” McGee piped up in confusion.

Gibbs glared at them all. 

Fornell simply glared back. “You’re the one who called us, Jethro. Unless you tell us what happened, we won’t even know where to start.”

Gibbs glared. Finally, he relented with a grunt. “Heard weird animal noise. Investigated. Found leopard on porch. Checked TV no escapees. Leopard followed me in and claimed the couch.”

“Weird animal noise?”

“Leopard. Thought it was a dog.”

“Why aren’t we waiting for Tony?”

“Didn’t call him.”

“Is Tony the leopard?” McGee broke in, still stuck on how similar Tony’s eyes were to the leopard.

“This isn’t a science fiction novel, McGeek.” 

“Tony!” 

“That’s my name. Don’t wear it out.”

McGee glanced between Tony and the leopard in confusion. “If you’re here, then who is that?” McGee pointed at the leopard.

Tony blinked. “Liara?”

“Who’s Liara?”

The leopard let out a loud half purr half roar and slowly rose from the couch, walking over to rub against Tony. Tony patted the leopard. “Hey girl. What happened to you?”

4 pairs of eyes stared at Tony in shock.

“DiNozzo!” Gibbs barked.

Tony stood up, back ramrod straight in reflex, “Boss?”

“She’s yours?”

“Er. Well kind of?”

“You can’t keep a leopard as a pet, DiNoetzo.”

“She’s not a pet. She just likes me.” Tony glared at Fornell, crossing his arms and daring Fornell to start something again.

“You know where she lives, though, right?”

“Sort of?”

“Good. Lead the way.”

“What?”

“We have a case to solve.”

“How did a leopard become an FBI case?”

“It didn’t, but I’m too curious to leave now, so lead on.”

Tony glanced at Gibbs, who just raised an eyebrow. Tony sighed and turned to head out the door, Liara easily keeping pace with him.

“How’d you know where we were, Tony?” McGee couldn’t help asking as they all headed out.

“I didn’t.”

“You just dropped by Gibbs’ house just because?”

“Sure. Why not? Don’t you?”

“No.” McGee looked at Tony like he’d lost his mind.

Tony shrugged. “Your loss.”

McGee just gave Tony a strange look before dropping the subject entirely as they all piled into Fornell’s van. 

“Mommy vehicle, Fornell?”

Fornell glared, “Carpool, DiNoetzo.”

Tony just smirked and took the front passenger seat since he would be giving directions. 

“How do you even know a leopard, Tony?” Bishop asked curiously.

“Long story.” Tony shrugged dismissively. He really didn’t want to get into Liara’s origins, right now. It wasn’t exactly easy to explain to anyone, but especially his coworkers, that he was a shaman.

Gibbs watched Tony carefully. He didn’t buy the story Tony told that he was just dropping by Gibbs’ house. Gibbs’ gut screamed that something was wrong with this picture.

It didn’t help that Liara, if that really was the leopard’s name, had followed them into the van and taken the row closest to Tony, which meant she was seated next to Gibbs. He could feel her heated stare. It felt like she was glaring daggers at his back.

Gibbs kept trying to tell himself that it was just what leopard’s did, but it set his gut off nonetheless. He tried to avoid looking at the leopard, but that didn’t stop his neck hairs from standing up. Fortunately, with Bishop and McGee in the back he had no need to glance back and could focus his attention on Tony, Fornell and where they were going.

Tony led them out of Alexandria, directing Fornell to take this exit and that exit until they got closer and closer to their destination. The directions turned into turn left here or turn right here as they wound their way through various streets until they reached a pretty large expanse of land in Clifton, Virginia. They took the very long driveway up to a decent sized house. 

Whoever lived here didn’t have to worry about the neighbor’s hearing them. They had so much land that their closest neighbor wasn’t even in shouting distance. It took them roughly 45 minutes to get there from Gibbs’ house.

Tony immediately jumped out of the van and headed for the house calling out, “Gregory!”

“Whose Gregory?” Bishop wondered aloud.

“Is it a tiger?” McGee teased.

“Nah. Gregory is my teacher. He lives here. Liara usually stays with him.”

“How did she get all the way to Gibbs’ house in Alexandria? It’s a 45 minute drive. For a leopard that’s like 1.5 hours and wouldn’t she have made the news?”

Tony shrugged. He suspected that Liara had some minor teleportation abilities, but wasn’t about to mention that to anyone. He had zero desire for people to actually shun him for things that were generally considered unbelievable.

Still looking around for Gregory, he knocked on the door. Tony wasn’t surprised when no one answered the door. Gregory was usually out and about in his fields.

Tony was surprised when Gregory didn’t appear shortly after they arrived. He’d always had a sixth sense for these kind of things. Tony didn’t think he’d ever visited Gregory without the guy showing up a couple of minutes after he arrived.

Worried now, Tony gestured for them to fan out and start exploring the grounds. Liara had vanished shortly after they exited the car, but she reappeared now and roared at Tony. Tony nodded and followed Liara.

Fornell and Gibbs went one direction, McGee and Bishop another. Gibbs tried to keep Tony in his line of site.

He was still worried about Tony, alas the leopard and Tony were covering ground faster than Gibbs wished to and were soon out of sight.

“Where do you think he could be?”

Gibbs grunted. He’d never heard of Gregory before and had no idea where he might be. “My bet is on DiNozzo.”

“Isn’t it weird for someone to live on this much land by themselves?”

Gibbs shrugged. “If I could afford it, I would.”

“What do you know about this guy?”

“Nothing.”

Liara roared from wherever she was. Tony and her had been travelling at the same speed for a while, but the Leopard definitely beat him when it came to speed. He adjusted his direction to head towards Liara knowing that she’d found something.

Tony stopped and stared. “No, no, no.” Tony couldn’t help muttering as he stared at Gregory’s dead body.

Tony pulled out his phone and hit speed dial one, “Gibbs. You guys better get over here.”

Tony didn’t know what he was going to do now. Gregory was the only one that he knew that could teach him to use his Shaman abilities. He really hadn’t learned much, yet.

He had barely figured out how to center himself enough to feel things outside himself. Liara helped him focus, but he couldn’t speak to her. Gregory claimed that the ability to speak to her would come with time, but until then he needed an actual teacher.

Even if he could speak to Liara, he still figured he’d need a teacher. She couldn’t reasonably teach him everything he needed to know about his abilities. Technically she was a creation of his abilities, so it seemed likely that what she could teach him would be limited.

The death of his teacher couldn’t be good. He had no idea who would want to kills his shaman teacher. To his knowledge everyone had liked Gregory.


	2. The Witness

“Tony?” Gibbs asked as he and Fornell arrived at Liara and Tony’s location.

“He’s dead, Gibbs.” Tony pointed to the location where Gregory’s body could be seen. There was a lot of blood on the ground. It was pretty obvious that a fight had taken place and the leopard had either been a part of it or had rolled in the blood after the fight was over.

“Let me call, Ducky and see if we can get jurisdiction. You’ll have to sit this one out, though, Tony.”

Tony nodded. “Who would do something like this?”

“You want me to call anyone?” Fornell offered. 

Gibbs shook his head. “Nah. We got it handled.”

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry your teacher’s dead, DiNoetzo.”

“Thanks Fornell. I’m sorry too.”

“You know anyone who would have a grudge against him?”

Tony slowly shook his head. “No. He had very few students. Maybe 2 others? Other than that he pretty much kept to himself. Neighbors liked him.”

“McGee take Bishop, go talk to the neighbors. See what they know.”

“Could the leopard have done this?”

“Liara? No. She loved Gregory. She would be more likely to have attacked whoever was hurting him.”

“I need to head back. Have to pick up Emily in the morning. You want me to call a taxi for you guys or something?”

“Nah. I’ll have an NCIS agent bring us a vehicle. They can ride back with Ducky.”

“Ok.” Fornell waved as he headed back to his van. He kind of wanted to be involved, but really there were no grounds for the FBI to stick their nose into this investigation. Plus, he really did have to pick up Emily tomorrow morning at an insanely early hour because of Diane’s work schedule.

Tony settled on the ground under a tree nearby. Far enough out of the way to hopefully not mess up anymore evidence than he already had, but close enough to watch what the team was doing. Or really what Gibbs was doing since he’d sent McGee and Bishop off instead of keeping them at the scene.

Gibbs placed a couple of brief calls and then started taking pictures and measurements. He wouldn’t move the body until after Ducky gave his ok, so he was limited in what could be done. Pretty much pictures, sketches and some minimal bagging and tagging was all that was safe to do.

The backup NCIS team arrived with 2 vans. Leaving one for Gibbs and team, they headed back out almost immediately. A few of the agents did stay behind to pitch in since the MCRT was down a member. It turned out that metro had more than their fair share of victims tonight and were quite happy to turn this one over to NCIS. 

Of course, as it turned out after McGee and Bishop returned from interviewing the neighbors and were able to take Gregory’s fingerprint it was NCIS jurisdiction anyway as Gregory was Lieutenant Gregory Richards. Ducky and Jimmy arrived shortly after that discovery. Even Tony hadn’t know that about Gregory’s past. 

Ducky inspected the body looking for any obvious causes of death. He shook his head as he realized that the cause of death wouldn’t be easy to determine as any number of the injuries could have caused the man’s death. Jimmy and Ducky loaded the body onto the stretcher taking it and any evidence already collected back with them to autopsy where they could more easily determine the cause of death. 

The team finished up and trooped back to headquarters. They even brought Liara with them. She was basically evidence now, after all. 

Tony grinned at the stares from security as they trooped into the building. It wasn’t every day a leopard was brought in as evidence. Tony hoped that this case was easy to solve. 

He didn’t know what he was going to do without his shaman teacher. He only knew of this one because his mother had made sure that he would be able to reach out to Gregory after he was out from under his father’s control. His father definitely didn’t believe in shamanism and would have done his level best to stop Tony from doing anything with it. 

Gregory’s number had been one of the stranger things left to Tony as part of a trust his mother left for him when he turned 40. He hadn’t been sure about shaman training, at first, believing what most others believed that it was basically witchcraft and thus evil or not even a real thing. 

Gregory had understood and had spent a significant amount of time explaining what Shamans really were to Tony. When Tony had truly understood that it wasn’t about working magic, but was instead about connecting with the environment around them, he had decided to give it a try. He still hadn’t really believed that he had this ability.

After all, he’d never experienced anything that would have made him even a bit abnormal. So he didn’t consider himself to have any power of any sort. Gregory insisted he did, however, and so the training began. 

When he’d first summoned Liara, Tony had been absolutely shocked at what his mind told him was impossible. At the same time, he could touch and feel her and his mind couldn’t argue with that even though it still thought it was impossible. After that, Tony had less trouble believing that he had power of some sort.

He still had trouble believing that all of this was real. Even when he saw it happen right in front of him, he struggled to believe it. Still after he summoned Liara the lessons began in earnest.

Still he could barely do more than feel the energy around him. They had just started the basics of aura sensing the last time Tony had a lesson. Tony didn’t really have a feel for it, yet. 

He didn’t even know how to go about finding a replacement Shaman teacher. It wasn’t like this was something you could just put an ad out in the paper for and someone would appear. Though, it would be nice if it worked that way.

He wasn’t sure a Mary Poppins figure would be overly helpful for his learnings, however. If he were part of the investigation, he might be able to talk to people that knew Gregory and find a new Shaman teacher that way. Actually, nothing was stopping him from doing that. 

Tony had a key to Gregory’s house. He could search the house and find out any contacts that Gregory had stashed away somewhere. Tony wished he’d met some of Gregory’s other students, but Gregory only did one on one lessons.

Tony knew he should actually try to figure out one of these cold cases, but he was more interested in figuring out who could possibly be his shaman teacher. He knew he should inform someone of where he was going, but he didn’t want to be told he couldn’t. Leaving headquarters, Tony drove back to Gregory’s. 

This time he didn’t bother looking at the crime scene. He just unlocked the door and headed inside. Starting in Gregory’s office, Tony started looking through the various papers on his desk. 

If he could find some phone numbers or even some information to help the team with the case he would consider it a win. Tony sorted through a bunch of papers. Gregory could use the computer, but he preferred paper. 

Despite his abilities as a shaman, organization clearly wasn’t one of Gregory’s abilities as his desk was absolutely strewn with papers. Before Tony could go through even more papers, so far he hadn’t found much of interest, his phone rang. Glancing at the display and seeing it was Gibbs, Tony sighed and answered the phone, “Very Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo at your service.”

“Where are you?”

“Gregory’s.”

“Why?”

“Personal reasons.”

“Get back here.”

“But Gibbs.”

“Now.” Click.

Tony looked at the phone as the call ended and just shook his head. He wished he’d found something useful, but he’d have to come back later. He could take some of the papers with him, but he didn’t want to block the team from finding something to help solve Gregory’s murder even on accident and he wasn’t sure when he’d have a chance to get back to going through the papers.

Tony wondered what had happened that would cause Gibbs to call him back to the office in the first place. Tony joined the team in the bullpen when he finally arrived. “What’s up?”

“Apparently, there’s a witness to Gregory’s murder?”

“What?”

“Yep, but Gibbs can’t interrogate him because no one can keep Liara calm or even lock her in a room and she keeps trying to take a bite out of the witness any time he comes anywhere near Gibbs or any of the rest of us, but mostly Gibbs.”

“Ok. Let me see if I can figure out what’s up with Liara. Where is she anyway?”

“With Gibbs in the observation room because she insists on following Gibbs everywhere he goes.”

Tony frowned. That wasn’t normal behavior for Liara. He wondered what she was up to.

Actually now that he thought about it, her behavior the entire time had been strange. Why had she shown up at Gibbs’ house? Shouldn’t she have come to him?

Tony entered the observation room to find Liara and Gibbs in a stare off. ”Having a disagreement with Liara?”

Liara purred and rubbed against Tony who gently rubbed his hand along her back. 

Gibbs glared at Tony and the now happy Liara. “Keep her away from me.”

“Aw. Gibbs. You’ll hurt her feelings. She likes you.”

Gibbs grunted and left the observation room for the interrogation room. Liara immediately tried to follow him. Tony chuckled. 

“Liara. Leave him alone. You can watch from in here and make sure he’s safe.” 

Liara’s ears perked up and she glanced between Tony and Gibbs uncertaintantly. Gibbs glared at her and Tony gestured for her to come to him. Liara fixed Gibbs with a deep glare before shaking her head and stalking haughtily over to Tony. 

Gibbs quickly moved to interrogation and shut the door before Liara changed her mind. He really wanted to know why Liara didn’t like this witness. It put him on edge.

Liara immediately put her paws on the window into interrogation her head zeroing in on Gibbs and the witness and keeping them in sight constantly. Tony patted Liara on the back. 

“Why are you so interested in Gibbs?” Tony wondered.

Liara purred and licked Tony’s face before sticking her nose back up against the window watching Gibbs and the witness. Tony turned his attention to the interrogation. It might have been just an interview if Liara hadn’t been so insistent on trying to take a bite out of the witness.

Even if she had just been a normal leopard her behavior would have been significant. Being something akin to Tony’s spirit animal meant that Tony and by extension the rest of the team gave her actions more weight. Thus, instead of going into the room planning to do an interview thinking the guy innocent, Gibbs now believed the guy to be guilty of something and he wouldn’t stop until he figured out what the witness had done to piss off a leopard.

“Name and occupation for the record.” Gibbs demanded.

“Patrick Snow, Stock broker.”

“How do you know Liara?”

“Liara?”

“The leopard.”

“I’ve never met her before.”

Liara let out a loud growl at that. Tony wasn’t sure if it could be heard in interrogation, but Tony knew the guy had just lied to Gibbs. Gibbs was going to take him to the cleaners for that.

Gibbs slapped his hand down on the table, causing an extremely loud sound and the table to shake significantly. “Don’t lie to me.”

“Seriously, I’ve never seen her before.”

“Wrong answer.”

“Perhaps this will jog your memory.” Gibbs grabbed the folder on the table that had the crime scene photos. He quickly grabbed one of the more gruesome ones and flipped it over in front of the witness. 

A flicker of satisfaction crossed Patrick Snow’s face. Tony noticed it immediately and Liara banged her paws against the glass angrily. This guy had a grudge against Gregory for some reason.

“Why am I being interrogated? I came here to give you information about his murder.” Patrick Snow nodded towards the picture Gibbs had put in front of him.

“Because you aren’t here to provide information. You’re here to direct suspicion away from you. You might have succeeded if it wasn’t for Liara.” Gibbs paused before directing a steely eyed glare at the so called witness, “You want to try this again? Without lying this time.”

“Why are you asking me what happened? Anthony DiNozzo is the one who murdered Gregory.”

Gibbs laughed out loud at that. “You’re going to accuse my agent of murdering someone who clearly meant a lot to him? You better have some evidence to back that up.”

“I do.” Patrick Snow pulled out a letter and placed it on the table.

“What’s that?”

Tony too wanted to know what the letter held. He wished he were in interrogation with Gibbs instead of just watching.

“Proof that your agent has been keeping secrets from you and has the ability to kill this man.”

A sense of dread filled Tony. This didn’t bode well at all. He really wanted to know what was in that letter now.

“In fact, the leopard killed Gregory.”

“If the leopard did it, how is DiNozzo the murderer?”

“The leopard is under DiNozzo’s control. He ordered it to murder Gregory.”

”What proof do you have of this?”

“It’s all here.” Patrick slid the letter over to Gibbs.

Gibbs picked up the letter and then held it out at arm’s length as he attempted to read it. He glared at the letter for a bit before putting it down. “You expect us to just believe this. Anybody could have written this. How is this evidence?”

“This is the exact terms of the trust Anthony DiNozzo inherited from his mother. You can verify them for yourself.”

“So?” Gibbs glared at Patrick.

“So it’s written right there that he’s a shaman. Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Should it?” 

“Doesn’t NCIS have a policy against hiring witches?”

“Actually, witches have served in the government for many years.”

“What?”

Gibbs shook his head, opening the door and ordering the agents standing outside, “Take him to a cell until he decides to tell us the truth.”

“You can’t hold me. I came here of my own free will.”

“Actually, I can. We can hold you for 48 hours to find proof of your crimes and you can bet we will have found proof by then.” With that parting shot, Gibbs walked out of interrogation and headed for the observation room. He would let the agents deal with Mr. Snow.


	3. Some Dead-Ends

He needed to talk to his SFA. He didn’t believe for a minute that Tony actually killed Gregory, but he wanted to know why Snow was setting his SFA up and why Tony hadn’t told him that he knew Snow.

Liara immediately jumped on Gibbs as soon as he entered the observation room and gave him a big wet lick across his face. Gibbs staggered back under the weight of the leopard. “Get her off of me.”

“Liara,” Tony warned.

Liara placed her front paws back on the ground and switched to rubbing her long, lean body against Gibbs’ legs as she tried to wind in and out of his legs. 

“DiNozzo!” Gibbs snarled.

“Sorry, boss. She likes you.” 

Gibbs sighed and moved further into the room in hopes that Liara would settle in one place and stop trying to trip him. “Who’s this Snow guy?”

“I have no idea, boss. I’ve never met him before in my life.”

“You sure?”

“Pretty sure.”

“How did he get a hold of the terms of the trust your mother left you then?”

“I have no idea, boss. If the team doesn’t figure it out, though, I definitely will. That information is supposed to be private.”

Gibbs grunted and left the observation room. Liara, of course, followed him. Tony followed after as they headed for the bullpen and to discuss the case with the team and figure out where they really were.

Tony still worried about how to find another shaman teacher, but that would have to wait until after things were more resolved with the case, apparently. Tony sat behind his desk and started on the cold case as he listened in on the sitrep going on between McGee, Bishop, and Gibbs.

Gibbs gave a brief overview of what happened with Patrick Snow and demanded that McGee get him more details on Patrick Snow and how he might know DiNozzo. McGee hurried back to his desk and tossed the remote at Bishop, who explained what they had found so far on Gregory and any contacts of his. They couldn’t find Gregory online at all really.

Bishop wanted to go investigate Gregory’s house and see if he was one of those who kept paper copies of everything and did his best to eliminate his online trail entirely. Gibbs shook his head. They didn’t have time for that right now.

It went against his convictions to not investigate something himself, but they were down a member. “See if Balboa can spare a couple of people to investigate the house for information on Gregory. In the meantime, we’ll have to start with Gregory’s commanding officer before his discharge. Get the list of anyone Gregory had contact with in the Navy and meet me at the van. McGee continue digging into Snow.”

Gibbs headed for the elevator and Liara followed after him. “DiNozzo, keep your leopard here.”

“Liara,” DiNozzo called out.

Liara glanced at Tony and then back at Gibbs and tried to follow Gibbs into the elevator. Gibbs glared at the leopard and pushed her out of the elevator. As the doors closed she turned around and padded back to Tony.

“Why are you so attached to Gibbs?” Tony wondered. 

Liara purred in response.

Tony’s voice dropped to a whisper, he leaned his face into her fur, “I wish I could hear you.”

Bishop quickly printed off Gregory’s Navy record and ran after Gibbs, taking the stairs to be safe. McGee watched Tony and the leopard as he waited for his searches to run. 

“Are you really a shaman?” McGee couldn’t help asking as he watched man and leopard who clearly had a bond of some sort.

Tony shrugged. “I’m not sure I’ll ever find out now. Gregory was the one teaching me and it’s not like there’s a shaman nightclub I can go to to hook up with a new teacher.”

McGee didn’t know how to take that response and returned to his computer in favor of something that he could make sense of. Unlike Gregory, Patrick Snow could be found all over the internet. “Patrick Snow might know some people that could teach you. He’s on like every supposed Shaman forum around. I have no idea if any of them are actually real though.”

”So he’s been stalking shamans?”

“Maybe?”

“His online history is definitely suspicious.”

“What else did you find?”

“He had some unexpected sums of money added to his accounts. He’s definitely hiding something.”

“See if you can trace where the money came from, McBanker.”

“Don’t you have a cold case to work on, Tony?”

“Ugh. Don’t remind me. I can’t even think right now.”

McGee shot Tony a sympathetic look before returning to his searches on Snow.

Bishop and Gibbs talked first with Gregory’s CO while he was in the Navy. Then they talked with the few people that Gregory hung out with while in the Navy. Everyone pretty much said the same thing. 

”Gregory generally kept to himself, but no one had anything bad to say about him.” 

At least, that was the party line they were being told. If anything, people had good things to say. Many sailors that served with Gregory had good things to say about Gregory helping them out when they were at their lowest and didn’t know what to do. 

The guy seemed to have a sixth sense for when people were struggling, but that wasn’t a crime and didn’t really help them figure out who would have murdered him. Everyone they talked to seemed genuinely shocked that he had been murdered. Gibbs and Bishop headed back to headquarters empty handed. 

Hopefully, McGee had found something for them or Balboa’s team that had headed over to Gregory’s house. Bishop stared out the window as Gibbs drove recklessly back to the Navy Yard. She could feel the fury rolling off of Gibbs in waves and didn’t want to ignite it in her direction.

Gibbs stormed into headquarters. He didn’t even wait for the van to come to a complete stop. Just threw it in park and jumped out. 

Bishop waited a few minutes, wanting to let Gibbs take the elevator alone. She took the stairs at a touch slower pace. She didn’t want to be there when Gibbs first arrived, but couldn’t take much longer than him or that would piss him off as well.

She breathed a sigh of relief when she jogged into the bullpen and saw McGee taking center stage and explaining what he’d found about Patrick Snow. That lead seemed a lot more promising than any of the discussions they’d had with people who had known Gregory in the Navy. She wondered if Balboa’s team had brought anything interesting back, but would wait until McGee finished going over Patrick Snow to bring it up.

“Dig deeper into those forums, McGee. See if you can find anyone that Snow was in contact with. Maybe someone passed Gregory’s information to Snow. Work with Abby if you need.”

McGee nodded and returned to his computer. 

“Did Balboa return, yet?”

Gibbs grunted. McGee shook his head.

Tony offered, “Apparently, they found a lot more paperwork than they expected and are still trying to make sure they found it all before returning.”

Bishop sighed. McGee took one look at Gibbs and muttered, “I’ll be in Abby’s lab.”

He quickly vanished before anyone could say anything else. Bishop wanted to follow him down to Abby’s lab as well, but knew she needed to see if she could find something that they’d missed or a pattern that revealed more information. 

”Autopsy,” Gibbs growled.

Liara followed him into the elevator this time and despite his glare, he didn’t chase her out. Tony still wished he could communicate with Liara. Her obsession with Gibbs seemed significant, but without being able to communicate he had no idea why she was behaving the way she was.

“Oh my!” Ducky exclaimed as the leopard followed Gibbs into the lab. 

“I knew there was a leopard at the scene, but I did not think you would bring it here.”

“It’s evidence.” Gibbs grunted. 

”Really, Jethro?” Ducky gave him a disapproving stare.

Gibbs just glared at Ducky, who clucked at him in censure. “You have a cause of death, Ducky?”

“Unfortunately, Jethro, I do.”

“So?”

“His actual cause of death was sanguination.”

“He bled to death?”

“Well he had a little help. He suffered at least one blow to the head before his death, which likely knocked him out long enough for him to bleed out. There’s also some strange markings in his internal organs that I can’t begin to make sense of, but that definitely contributed to the speed in which he died.”

“Thanks Duck.” Gibbs turned to leave, Liara following him.

“That leopard has certainly taken an extraordinary interest in you, Jethro. I hope that’s not a sign that you are in danger.”

Gibbs ignored Ducky’s comment. He didn’t know why Liara kept following him around despite DiNozzo’s explanation that she liked him. She actually knew Tony; it didn’t make any sense for her to follow him even if she did like him.

By the time Gibbs returned to the bullpen it was in complete uproar as everyone tried to talk over each other. Not only Bishop, McGee, and Tony, but Abby was there too. Gibbs whistled, a shrill, sharp sound, “Silence.”


	4. The plot thickens

The room immediately quieted. “Abby, you first.”

“The blood on the leopard matches Gregory’s and a second person. I also swabbed the mouth and found the same person’s blood in the mouth. Whoever did this will have bite marks that match Liara’s teeth.”

“Good job, Abby.”

“That’s not all, Gibbs.” Abby bounced up and down in excitement.

“What else, Abbs?”

“Well McGee and I contacted Tony’s inheritance lawyer and found out that only one person had recently requested a copy of the trust Tony inherited, a Crispian Paddington.”

“Why would my cousin need to know the terms of the trust?”

“I don’t know. I asked the lawyer about it and she said that it was his right to request them because with Uncle Clive’s death, he took over managing any bequests your mother left that had not been fulfilled.”

Tony frowned, but didn’t say anything further. That seemed sketchy to him. He’d never really gotten along with Crispian, but the trust had been handed over to Tony’s control already.

“We also found that the strange amounts of money in Patrick Snow’s account could be traced back to Crispian.”

“Best have someone get Crispian in here, then.”

“Um. About that, boss.” McGee muttered.

“What, McGee?”

“He lives in England. He can’t exactly just fly out here.”

Gibbs glared at McGee. “Get him in MTAC or on the computer or have our office abroad question him.”

“Um. Yes, boss. Right away, boss.”

“Oh, but that’s not the best part. Apparently, the Paddingtons have a long history of shamans. At least, according to the post that the user we’ve traced back to Crispian made in response to Patrick Snow looking for someone who could help train him to be a shaman.”

Gibbs turned to Tony. “You know anyone you could contact about this?”

“Maybe… I haven’t talked to Uncle Jeffrey in a while, but if he’s willing to talk to me I can probably get some information from him about it.”

“Do it,” Gibbs ordered.

Tony nodded and picked up his phone to call Uncle Jeffrey.

About that time, Balboa and his team stumbled into the bullpen. “It’s all here. Every last shred of paper Gregory Paddington owned.”

“Paddington?”

“Yep. Apparently, he changed his name when he came to the US, but his original name was definitely Paddington. We’ve got a whole box of things addressed to Gregory Paddington.”

“Sounds like you can probably find another Shaman teacher from amongst your relatives, Tony.” McGee offered.

Tony shrugged. Perhaps he could. He kind of wanted to know why his relatives were trying to frame him for murder and had actually killed one of their own first before he went barking up that family tree, though.

“Tony. You keep working your uncle. McGee have Snow brought back to interrogation. I think we have enough to make him talk now.”

“Bishop make sure we have all the pieces tied together. I’m giving you a shot at Snow first. I want to see how he responds when confronted with the circumstantial evidence we have now.”

Bishop nodded, grabbing as much info as she could. She wanted a nice thick pile of evidence to make him blanch if needed. McGee hustled off to get Snow up to interrogation.

Balboa and the rest took the paperwork and started going through it, combing for more information that would tie into Patrick Snow or whatever was going on between Gregory and Crispian.

Bishop took a seat in interrogation with a folder bulging with papers and waited for Snow to be brought in. 

Snow took one look at her and frowned, “Who are you?”

“Agent Bishop.”

“I demand that you let me go. I’ve done nothing wrong. I was simply trying to let you know that one of your own murdered Gregory.”

“How exactly is it that you know Gregory again?”

“He is my teacher.”

“He’s lying. He’s lying,” A female voice screamed in Tony’s head. 

“What?” Tony asked out loud.

“Snow is lying.”

“Liara?”

“Yes.”

“But how?”

“I’ll explain later. First, don’t let him get away with lying.”

Tony frowned, standing up from his desk and heading for interrogation.

“Tony?”

“I’ll be back, McGee.”

Tony joined Gibbs and Liara in the observation room. “You know he’s lying, right?”

Gibbs grunted. 

Bishop frowned at Snow before starting to present the circumstantial evidence they’d found. 

“I work for Crispian. He pays me to invest his money in the stock market.”

After a bunch of lies and misdirection, Gibbs finally barged into the interrogation room. “Bishop out.”

Bishop gathered her papers and left. She returned to help Balboa and the guys sort through the rest of the paperwork they’d brought back. Tony stayed and watched the interrogation. 

He should tell them what he’d found out about Crispian, but something told him he didn’t want to miss this.

“Now then. We know you’re lying about Gregory being your teacher. Start over. This time with the truth.” Gibbs growled.

“That is the truth,” Snow insisted.

Gibbs just folded his arms and waited, acting like he had all the time in the world. “Ok. Ok. Gregory isn’t my teacher, but I wanted him to be. I’ve always wanted to be a shaman. That’s why I was on all those forums. I thought I’d gotten lucky when Crispian told me he could hook me up with a shaman if I did some favors in the market for him. I agreed immediately.”

Just like that Snow broke and all the sordid details spilled out, how Gregory told him he had no shaman abilities and thus the training would be worthless for him, how Crispian had insisted that he did and told him he knew someone better than Gregory that would teach him to unlock his potential. 

Of course, that wasn’t the only surprise the interrogation revealed.

“He will be good mate for you.”

“What?” Tony looked at Liara in confusion.

“Gibbs. He will be a good mate for you.”

“You’re crazy.”

“I’m not. He will help you where I can not.”

Tony looked at Liara like she was crazy, but she just tossed her head haughtily. “You’ll see.”

Tony glared at Liara and turned back to the interrogation as Snow continued to spill his guts and implicate Crispian, but now the seed had been planted and he couldn’t stop imagining a relationship with Gibbs. He tried to focus on Snow’s words and how Crispian had put him in touch with Mephisto, who had apparently taught Snow one single spell. 

From what Snow described, Tony didn’t think this was actually shaman magic. He was pretty sure it was something else, straight up witchcraft perhaps. Anyway, Snow had gone to Gregory to prove to him that he did have the ability to be a shaman. 

He hadn’t actually been intending to kill Gregory, but Gregory had insisted that his new abilities didn’t make him a shaman and he’d had to prove Gregory wrong. Tony was pretty sure that explained the internal markings that Ducky had noticed.

Apparently, Snow had panicked and left when Gregory had fallen to the ground. He’d called Crispian about what to do and Crispian had told him not to worry about it that he would call his cousin Anthony DiNozzo to finish the job. 

Snow didn’t know who had actually finished the job as he’d left after that, but he’d assumed DiNozzo had done so. Tony really wanted to strangle his cousin. Sure he’d picked on the guy when they were kids, but framing him for murder seemed a bit over the top.

Finally, after they’d gotten every last piece of information gleaned from Snow that Gibbs thought they could, he directed someone to type up Snow’s statement and have him sign it. Heading back to the bullpen, Gibbs demanded, “Anyone know anything about a Mephisto?”

“Mephisto Paddington?” Balboa looked up from the boxes he was buried in.

“Don’t know. Maybe.”

“Probably.” Bishop agreed, looking at a piece of paper in front of her, “Says here he immigrated to the US less than 2 months ago. Looks to be a black sheep of the Paddington family.”

“Somebody bring him in and find me something on what happened between Gregory, Crispian, and Mephisto.” Gibbs growled.

“I think I have that information, Gibbs.” Bishop held up a piece of paper from the set that she’d been looking at. 

“Well…” Gibbs glared at Bishop.

“It appears that when Clive passed, while most of his fortune and mansion went to Crispian there was a large section of his will that was ceded to Gregory as the only other shaman master besides Clive in the immediate family. If Gregory were to die, that would go to Mephisto who while not a shaman master was quite skilled in witchcraft and no one had heard from the only other shaman master who might still be alive, a Dylan Paddington.”

“So Mephisto killed Gregory to get these artifacts and Crispian helped by giving him Snow and trying to frame Tony. What does Crispian have against you, Tony?”

Tony shrugged. “We’ve never really gotten along. I always thought it had something to do with my father, but maybe not. Maybe it’s because Crispian doesn’t have the shaman skills that most of the rest of the family has and I do. I know that when I was believed to not have any abilities that everyone thought Crispian and I would get along great since he didn’t either, but we never did. To be honest, he’s a bit of an arsehole.”

“What about Mephisto?”

“I don’t remember Mephisto, but perhaps Uncle Jeffrey does. I’ll talk to him.”

“Is Snow still lying to us? Liara seemed pretty angry with him. Maybe he’s the one who killed Gregory and is still trying to distract from him being the one at fault?”

“I don’t know. I’ll ask her.”

“What? You can’t talk to a leopard, Tony.”

“Shaman, remember. I can now.” Tony grinned.

Gibbs followed Tony back to Liara who was still in the waiting room watching Snow be booked. 

“DiNozzo, are you ok?”

“Never better Gibbs.”

“Can you really talk to Liara?”

“Just started today.”

“Ask her why she follows me.”

Tony coughed. “I don’t think you really want to know that.”

Gibbs frowned. “Don’t keep secrets, Tony.”

“I’m not, Gibbs, but really you don’t want to know.”

“Just tell me.” Gibbs stepped into Tony’s space, his presence overpowering.

“Fine. She thinks you and I are supposed to be mates.”

“What?!”

“I told you you didn’t want to know.” Tony shrugged and turned to Liara. “Did Snow kill Gregory?”

She growled. “He may as well have. He did something that broke Gregory’s connection to me.”

“You had a connection to Gregory?”

“Yes. He was your teacher. He knew how to talk to me.”

“Ok. Go on.”

“After that he called someone. I know not who. He made a second phone call and then vanished.”

“I tried to help Gregory, but I couldn’t. I tried to reach out to you, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave Gregory alone.”

“What happened?”

“A small conjurer came. He went to use magic on Gregory. I bit him.” Liara bared her teeth savagely. “He tried to use magic on me, but I dodged. He was not a very good magician. He couldn’t concentrate long enough to cast his spell on Gregory because I kept distracting him. He finally gave up and pulled a sharp blade out and cut Gregory open. I tried to stop him, but he was too powerful for me with the dagger. I chased him away, but he managed to kick Gregory in the head when he left. After that, I came to get help, but I got lost and could only find your scent at your mate’s.”

Tony’s head reeled from Liara’s description of what happened. He hoped that Mephisto was the sorcerer she talked about because if he wasn’t they were missing someone majorly involved in their case. Apparently, someone had heard Gibbs’ order and acted fast as they brought someone new into the interrogation room.

“That is him!” Liara snarled. 

“That’s our guy, boss. Now, you just have to get a confession because I don’t think a leopard’s word via me will fly in court.” DiNozzo grinned at Gibbs.

Gibbs just grunted and left to interrogate the guy. Knowing he was their murderer, he looked him over for teeth marks and sure enough found them. They would just need Abby to run this guy’s DNA and confirm it was him. 

It was a good thing that despite Tony’s joking they didn’t actually need the leopard to testify beyond the bite marks on Mephisto’s legs because Mephisto wasn’t breaking. It wasn’t until Tony finally got a hold of Uncle Jeffrey that they got the full story. Apparently, the Paddington’s came from two powerfully magical families. 

A long time ago a sorcerer and a shaman had married. They had thought to combine their powers, though, the shaman had not realized how corrupt the sorcerer really was. Thus even in their children their powers did not mesh. 

Some children had shaman power. Others sorcerer power. Some still had neither.

The difference between the sorcerers and the shamans had driven a wedge between the family with most falling on one side or the other. Uncle Clive was the only one loved by both sides of the family. Probably, mostly due to the artifacts that had been past down to him.

Jeffrey was one of those who had neither and had managed to avoid most of the family politics. He hadn’t realized that Mephisto had become so power hungry that he would purposefully murder a shaman to get the artifacts Clive had passed on. Crispian would be dealt with as well, Jeffrey promised.


	5. Mate?

They definitely had Crispian as an accessory, but with his lawyers he would probably weasel out of it if Jeffrey didn’t help. Jeffrey had also promised to try to contact Dylan Paddington. He thought that she was still alive and would make a good teacher for Tony's shaman abilities if he wanted.

While surprised that the last shaman in the Paddington family was apparently a girl, what surprised Tony the most was that Gregory’s will left everything to him. Jeffrey insisted it was because Tony had the ability to unite both sides of the family. Liara just purred smugly. 

“Your mate will help you.” she reminded.

“He’s not my mate.” Tony glared. 

“Sure about that, are you? Your scent is stronger at his house than your place.”

Tony blushed. He couldn’t deny that he had always had a special relationship with Gibbs, but he’d never considered it to be romantic until Liara had brought it up. With the case wrapped up, Tony went home to sleep. 

Liara would stay with him, for now, at least, until after he figured out what he was doing with all of Gregory’s things. Sleep wouldn’t come, however, and Tony finally gave up and headed over to Gibbs’ house. 

“About time, DiNozzo.”

“What?”

“Why were you really at my house when we first found Liara.”

“Oh. Heh.” Tony rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. “It’s always easier for me to meditate in your basement while you’re working on the boat, boss, and I’d had a weird feeling all day that I couldn’t place. I’d hoped that watching you work on the boat would help me figure things out. It usually does.”

Liara shoved Tony’s legs and pushed him into Gibbs. “See, he is your mate. He helps you.”

Gibbs caught Tony and stabilized him so that they didn’t end up on the floor.

“Sorry. She really wants us to get together.”

“So you don’t know?”

“Know what?”

“I thought when you showed up here tonight that you knew.”

“Knew what, Gibbs?”

“My feelings for you.”

“Huh? What are you talking about?”

“Tony, I’ve loved you for a very long time, but because I was your boss I tried to keep them in check and not pressure you. You never gave any indication that you were interested, so I didn’t push.”

Tony stared at Gibbs, his whole equilibrium thrown off. “What?”

“Why else do you think you feel comfortable here when no one, not even Bishop or McGee or Abby, feels the same?” Gibbs paused before diving off the deep end, “This can be your home, too, if you want it.”

“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Let’s not go too fast here. Relationship first. Moving in later. Much later.”

“Whatever you say.” Gibbs agreed, pulling Tony in for a deep mesmerizing kiss that made Tony forget what they were even talking about in the first place. He didn’t mind, though, he was right where he wanted to be, even if he did have to deal with a smug leopard in his head repeating, “Mate. I told you so.”

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for the long break. I do have the next 7 stories written though, so I'm hoping that I can keep up daily posting through December, but we'll see what happens.
> 
> My 2018 Prompt collection is open [here](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/cutsycat_NCIS_Prompts_2018/profile). Just click the sign up link. ;) It will remain open until the beginning of 2019. I'm hoping to complete all the 2018 prompts by the end of 2019. Here's hoping muse cooperates.
> 
> If you are not an ao3 member, you can prompt me [here](http://cutsycat.livejournal.com/50701.html). Please follow the same rules as are listed in the above link. However, because this is a handmade prompt form(that thinks it's a poll), it is considerably more limited than what ao3 provides, so please use the ao3 form if you're an ao3 member. Please note the name option is for a name that I can say this is for so that you know it's for you. Since this is for non ao3 members it won't be true gifts, but you will be mentioned in the notes.
> 
> For any authors that want to chat and/or are looking for a place where they can toss plot ideas around and get input from people, you can come join my discord server that is specifically geared towards writing/encouraging people to write and authors. The invite link is [here](https://discord.gg/HFvwpCq). If you're not an author, but want to chat with me about writing/stories or anything else you are welcome to join. I reserve the right to boot you from my server if all you do is pester me about updates, however. *grin* Really anyone who wants to talk about writing and/or plot ideas for various stories is welcome to join. 
> 
> I've started a new [poll](https://cutsycat.livejournal.com/55450.html) regarding my series and which ones people most want to see continued in place of the Rapprochement series which I have brought to an end for now... 
> 
> Note: The Bishop Entanglement, Crazy Cat Tale, and Pregnant FBI Agent series will be continued no matter what, so you don't need to vote for those. For those who don't have livejournals just leave a comment with your responses. Thanks!
> 
> Also, I'm looking for some writing buddies. Full details are [here](https://cutsycat.livejournal.com/53610.html). It is friends locked, so you'll have to add me as a friend on lj before you can read it.
> 
> Also, Drakonyashka has translated a couple of my works into Russian. [Tutelage](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12378780) and [Imbue](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12378840). Go support them. 


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